


A Likeness of Lord Anthony Bridgerton, taken by Sir Henry Granville.

by runrarebit



Category: Bridgerton (TV)
Genre: Anthony Bridgerton not being exactly straight, Bearding, Bisexual Benedict Bridgerton, Flirting, M/M, Naval Gazing, Queer Themes, Regency, hints of Henry Granville/Anthony Bridgerton, hints of Henry Granville/Benedict Bridgerton, introspective, mentioned Siena Rosso/Anthony Bridgerton, mentioned pegging, mentions of Eloise Bridgerton possibly being queer, one sided Simon Basset/Anthony Bridgerton, referenced Genevieve Delacroix/Lucy Granville, referenced Henry Granville/Lord Wetherby/others, referenced Lucy Granville/others, supportive platonic marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:48:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29457753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runrarebit/pseuds/runrarebit
Summary: (ETA: Changed the title, because I couldn't resist the nagging sensation that the summary worked better as the title, which now means I need a new summary, as I don't think the old title worked better as the summary in turn, so-)Sir Henry Granville is commissioned to create a portrait of the Bridgerton family on behest of its Matriarch, but circumstances being as they are, and Bridgertons not all in the one place to sit for him, he finds himself first in London, engaged in the act of taking a likeness of the Viscount- in more ways than one.
Relationships: Henry Granville/Lord Wetherby, Minor or Background Relationships detailed in tags
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	A Likeness of Lord Anthony Bridgerton, taken by Sir Henry Granville.

**Author's Note:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS: For references to homophobia and the legal persecution of queer men, please let me know if I missed any.
> 
> So, somehow I wrote this while moving, which surprised me. I'll just leave it here and exit in the hope someone finds it interesting. Thank you very much to anyone who reads it, and for any comments or kudos! Stay safe out there!

His portrait of the Duke and Duchess Hastings was apparently such a delight with the young Lady’s mama that he soon finds his friend Mr Benedict Bridgerton approaching him on the Lady’s behalf with the request he take a likeness of all her children.

At first it is simply to be a set of miniatures, and then a great family portrait, herself included— but such-and-such a son is from home and such-and-such a daughter is busy at her husband’s country seat and such-and-such an eldest son is intent on staying in London to deal with some business while the rest— including even his friend— go down to the family’s own country seat that the plan becomes to take some preliminary sketches of whomsoever is at hand to composite them together later, and _then_ becomes the commission of a set of full sized portraits of each whenever he can manage to secure enough time from one to sit.

It is all a kind of lackadaisical madness that quite amuses him, this chance to see inside the nest where his friend hatched and grew and feathered himself. The whole thing fuelled on the Bridgerton part by an uncommon degree of family fondness and the kind of well-handled finances that makes the ever increase in scale of the project— with its ever increase in _cost_ — no impediment.

He manages a few preliminary sketches of one of the girls before the family leaves, the one who has been in Bath for the whole season and so he has little, if any, even passing acquaintance with her looks— a pleasant, smiling, pretty girl who sits uncomplainingly and seems less the terror than the eldest sister still at home. A girl he knows to be Benedict’s favourite— if his friend would admit to having favourites— and an obviously clever girl, but also obviously not the sort of clever, peculiar creature that enjoys sitting still for long periods of time without questions or complaint. Especially solely for an endeavour of _looks_.

He waves his friend, and his friend’s family, off with a vague promise of perhaps joining them for a week or so to do some further sketches— his own business permitting— and, in secret, his own dubious tolerance for spending much time with those _not of his sort_ making it easy to make excuses to himself for why that week or so may be put off, and its length shortened to perhaps a handful of days— but work is work, and paying work is usually of the sort that gets proudly displayed, and displayed work tends to lead to even more work, and, in truth, he does enjoy what he does.

The Bridgertons are no hard subject to work from, either. For all they are _not his sort_ — or, if some of them may perhaps skate the line of his sort they have not yet crossed it— they are a truly pleasant family, and peculiar enough in their way to remain diverting. The thought of spending time with them at their country seat brings with it the thought of spending more time with Benedict, of allowing that friendship to grow closer, of showing his friend the world that he can one day see Benedict truly being part of, and he cannot regret that idea.

So, while he is staying in town, delighting in his Darling Wetherby’s body and the force of his Darling Wetherby’s hips, in between finishing off a couple of unfinished other, non Bridgerton, commissions, he takes the trouble of enquiring after the one Bridgerton on hand to sit for him. One Benedict has already introduced him to, but that has not ever shown much inclination for their mama’s project.

So it is that the first of the siblings he ends up devoting paint and canvas to is the eldest, the Viscount himself. It says something, something quite possibly quite unkind, that Benedict feels the need to apologize for his brother in advance in a way that makes him uncertain whether his friend worries Lord Bridgerton will bore him to death or act the frightful bore and scare him off.

 _I hope you will not find him frightfully dull_ , Benedict then adds, as well as, _I am afraid he does not have an artistic bone in his body_ , as well as, _and he has been in such an ill humour recently_. A sigh and it is all capped off with, _be polite and he should be polite in return. If nothing else mother taught him proper manners_.

What a charming prospect. He is quite in _raptures_.

Of course he has seen the Viscount around the Ton, the man is hardly a recluse— though more a recluse than most in his position, it has to be said. The Ton does love to gossip, even before that Whistledown creature set up her wicked little trade in bum fodder, and the gossip about the Viscount has always been his reluctance to enter the marriage market and the fact he has a Mistress— but only the _one_ — and since he took her has stayed away from the dens of ill repute so favoured by their _conventional_ contemporaries.

 _What a pretty man_ is his first thought at being properly introduced to Lord Bridgerton. An awkward first thought to have when the one doing the introducing is one’s own dear friend and the Viscount in question’s younger brother, but a man cannot help his nature, or an artist his passion for beauty.

Viscount Bridgerton is smaller than his younger brother, and finer boned, with richly brown eyes and a compelling intensity about him that edges on the slightly mad. His smile is stiff, his body awkward, his conversation little and without wit at first. In truth the first impression he has of the man is something of of a wild ram, caught in the far hills of Scotland and then penned in to be sold at market. _Ill at ease_.

That is their first encounter, and encounter that barely lasts longer than it takes to form such an impression, as he is quickly encompassed in a whirl of further Bridgertons, asked to stay for tea, and then dismissed home with a full belly and a head echoing with the demanding questions of the children and Benedict’s favourite girl.

An interesting creature, her. He wonders where her eyes would linger if she ever found herself at one of his soirees.

The next time he meets the Viscount he meets the man alone, summoned finally after the man has spent a whole couple of weeks dodging his attempts to make an appointment to work on the portrait. He gets grumbled at for his troubles, the Viscount making it clear he is only acquiescing to this great torment to please his mother, and then graciously permitted to choose the room with the best light to start working.

Pretty though he may be the Viscount remains awkward, clearly uncomfortable with the attention. An odd thing, he thinks, considering the impression of pride Benedict also gave him of the man.

The preliminary sketches do not look promising. He can only imagine the criticisms his friend will give to the end result if he were to put paint to canvas and produce a likeness of a man that so much looks like he needs to be attended by a good physician come primed with an effective purgative.

He is sure the last time he had such a look on his own face it was because he and his Darling had been a little too eager with only spit and no salve or oil to ease the way— a cause that at first he dismisses as the reason for Lord Bridgerton’s particular expression, though by the end of the second visit—

The intent, at first, is simply to make the man relax a little— a smile out of the question, he imagines— so it begins with a little joking, some light conversation, the sort designed to put a man at ease— but the man in question still is _very pretty,_ and he may be devoted and in love and the only _looking_ her ever really does is when he is looking for a companion for the both of them for the night— but a man cannot always stop himself when faced with the urge to flirt.

 _Gentle_ flirtation, of course, not of the type to be noticed by most of the stiff necked, starched cravated, young men of the Ton— the type of young man he assumes Lord Bridgerton is right up until the moment the man flushes a soft pink and flirts back, just a little, before catching himself and staring at him with those lovely sloe-eyes wide.

 _Afraid_ he quickly realises, afraid in a way that makes a spasm of sympathy overcome him and his own honour demand that he pretend that no such flirtation ever took place on either of their parts, everything quickly returning to professionalism and careful pleasantries.

It is on the way home in the carriage that he allows himself the luxury of contemplation, little facts he did not know he knew suddenly connecting together in his mind like the fine web of lace around one of his wife’s handkerchiefs.

The Mistress— an opera singer, he remembers, and from there it is easy to come to the name of Siena Rosso, and from Siena Rosso to things his wife’s dear friend and sometimes lover Madame Genevieve Delacroix has said.

A friend of hers taken up with a man, a drunken confession on his part that he has acted as if he has forgotten— she is one of the few women his flesh will rouse for, that he prefers men, that he despises himself for his weakness, his _sin_ — Madame Delacroix’s friend’s need to keep this man close, to please him, so she will be safe and provided for. Siena Rosso’s reputation as being willing to offer a man _certain acts_ that some would deem unnatural, especially if the _aggressor_ was a woman— certain acts that quite a few ladies of his own acquaintance happily provide for their husbands and lovers, but Siena Rosso is not one of them, she is yet to choose to cross over into their different style of scandal.

Madame Delacroix herself coming to him to ask his opinion of an _object_ her friend was intending to purchase to use on this man, to ask him if the shape should be changed from what would garner a woman’s pleasure, if it should be smaller or larger or curved more or straight.

He had recommended a shop, gone so far as to show the Madame an object of his own— carved ivory and very lifelike, providing that same thrilling, splitting pleasure as his Darling when business took them from each other’s sides— and had later that month seen her with one of her own, strapped around her hips with black leather, and pursuing his giggling wife around the pianoforte before hoisting her up onto it and having her to the accompaniment of a riot of mispressed keys.

 _My friend says he is very pleased with it_ , Madame Delacroix had told him as she was thanking him for his advice in choosing the object. _As is my friend. She feels quite the Lord taking her Lady wife_ — and at the time he had thought that an odd way to put things, but perhaps it makes sense.

To think, he had helped chose a prick for Siena Rosso to fuck her Viscount with.

Her Viscount who is the elder brother of his dear friend.

He doubts Benedict has any idea— _what would the man say_? Wide eyed and horrified, and probably speechless, is all he can imagine if that truth ever slipped.

Well, it will not from his lips. He is no traitor to his own kind.

How strange, though, to think Lord Bridgerton to be the same as him.

_Does it run in families?_

Of course Benedict is not as he is, he has seen Benedict with his wife— and even before that seen Benedict’s eyes on the bare breasts and buttocks of their models— but he has also seen those same dark eyes linger on differently shaped buttocks, on flatter chests, and exposed pricks. Benedict, he has always assumed, is one of those lucky devils that can go for _both_.

There have been moments in which he has entertained the idea of seducing his friend into the bed he shares with his Darling— Benedict is a very handsome man after all— but those fantasies do not linger past any proper inspection. He would rather keep a friend for life than take a lover for a night that would flee in horror in the morning light.

He could probably seduce the brother— There was a brittleness to those sloe-eyes in that moment that he found quite compelling. He has his own preferences, his ways of pleasure— with his Darling and with most other men that he has had in the past— but every now and then even he sees someone and feels the urge to _take_ — but to take Lord Bridgerton to bed would betray Benedict and lose him his friend in a way that could very well prove less satisfying than taking the younger Bridgerton to bed would be.

Still, he decides to continue to make himself agreeable to Lord Bridgerton in case he should change his mind. It has been a while since he and his Darling have found a man they would both like to take their turns with, instead of a man to take turns on _him_ with his Darling.

He does contemplate letting himself become a little _easier_ with the dark eyed man, letting some gentle words, soft encouragement, and perhaps an invitation to one of his evenings slip. Even if he does not take the man to bed himself a good and thorough _buggering_ would probably do Lord Bridgerton the world of good. Heaven knows it does him when he is feeling troubled, and the Viscount is quite obviously that— but, again, Benedict would not like it, and even if that was not a concern he does not yet know the elder Bridgerton to trust the man in company with his circle.

A pretty man, even a pretty man of _his sort_ , is not worth himself or his dearest friends going to the gallows over if his assessment of the man’s character turns out to be wrong.

So it is he sticks to pleasantry and agreeableness as the portrait comes along, Lord Bridgerton making fewer and fewer excuses to avoid him as the time passes, sloe-eyes sometimes lingering on his face, his lips, sweet, small, soft smiles sometimes coming across that so-often disagreeable mouth.

He is there working on the portrait when the Duke and Duchess Hastings arrive unexpectedly to spend the evening— her just beginning to show the fullness and swell of child— as the Duke apparently has some urgent business in town but cannot bear to be parted from his Lady wife or bear the idea of her missing the chance to spend time with her family.

Somehow he ends up with his own invitation to dine with them—the price of all his agreeableness, he assumes— a strange little interloper in this family scene, without either his wife or his Darling or any of his friends, his _kind_ , only the secret of Lord Bridgerton’s he knows but cannot acknowledge.

It is an interesting evening.

He has more thoughts on his way home in the carriage, prime among them being that he is very, very glad that he has never been in love with a sister’s husband, as it looks like a very uncomfortable position to find oneself in. He does wonder if Lord Brigertons’ attachment predates the Duchess’— then dismisses himself as a fool. _Of course it does_ , it’ll date back to Eton or Oxford or something of the like. The school room and shared beds, wandering hands in the dark.

The public school system really is terribly homoerotic. He can remember his own embarrassing school boy passions— and school boy fumblings— far too clearly. What a way to raise the young men of the nation in a habit they are at the same time taught is a sin. A _crime_.

_He wonders if Hastings ever took up that offer so evident in those pretty brown eyes?_

How many Bridgerton mouths has the man spent inside? Bridgerton bodies? Bridgerton _arses_?

Ah, he is being crass.

Anyway, awkward, repressed Anthony probably would not let himself be had over the nearest pianoforte so easily, no matter what it was he truly wanted. He seems to type more inclined to pine from afar and then take his misery out on everyone around him without ever being honest of the cause.

Poor creature.

He, himself, may live in fear for his life for what he is, but at least he has chosen to _live_.

When he arrives home he cannot help the impulse to enfold his wife in his arms and thank her for her great kindness to him, ask her one last time if their life has made her as happy as it has made him, and then smile when she calls him _a very silly man_ , swats at his arm, and takes one of her own lovers to bed while he goes in search of his Darling and the hard and splitting pleasure of his Darling’s prick.

 _Poor creature_ , indeed.

In any event, the portrait, when it is done, turns out to be a very fine one indeed. Perhaps one of his best.


End file.
